


A Leap Over the Line

by doublejoint



Category: Bleach
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-13 21:46:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29408574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doublejoint/pseuds/doublejoint
Summary: There are parts of Tatsuki that she does not know, that are not strictly off-limits but that skirt the boundaries.
Relationships: Arisawa Tatsuki/Inoue Orihime
Kudos: 6
Collections: February Ficlet Challenge 2021: Apocalypse No





	A Leap Over the Line

**Author's Note:**

> For Day 13 of the February Ficlet Challenge: Collapse

Orihime is fifteen the first time she feels something when she touches Tatsuki’s hand. Static shock, Tatsuki says, but Orihime’s caught up in thinking about the red string of fate, tying them together, or maybe the static on a spring day means that she is turning into a giant robot of her own accord. 

“Get your head out of the clouds,” Tatsuki says. “I brought you some leftovers.”

Tatsuki’s mother’s cooking is good, nothing like what Orihime makes for herself, but it’s nice to know someone else is thinking of you. Though Tatsuki always says that they’d had extra, Orihime knows it’s always because Tatsuki always makes sure that they do, and her mother always agrees. If it’s not something they want to acknowledge, then how can she thank them in kind?

* * *

They are friends. Close, closer than anyone maybe, spinning out from each other’s orbits and back in again. There will always be things that they don’t share, places Orihime’s been that Tatsuki cannot go, but the same can be said the other way around. Orihime can handle herself in a fight against a malevolent spirit, but she doesn’t know a thing about karate, and there are depths to Tatsuki’s intensity and competitive spirit that she can’t quite glimpse. They are slightly beyond her reach, her hand closing around nothing, but then she thinks of the look in Tatsuki’s eyes after she’d been away for so long, and it’s the same thing reflected back into her, isn’t it?

It’s not fun to be left out, though. Orihime’s not a possessive person; people don’t belong to others to act as others wish them to. She’d never get that way about Tatsuki, especially, and even if she were to try, Tatsuki would never let her. But Orihime wants, and wants, and wants. There are parts of Tatsuki that she does not know, that are not strictly off-limits but that skirt the boundaries, like the way Orihime wonders how Tatsuki kisses. Is she shy about it, like the way Orihime’s seen her flirt, suddenly intimidated by something she’s not comfortable with? Would it make any difference if it were Orihime she were kissing, and which way would that tilt the scales? What would it be like to kiss Tatsuki, to be engulfed by the familiar smells of plain lip balm and sweat?

* * *

Orihime is twenty the first time she really thinks about kissing Tatsuki, and twenty-one (just barely) when she actually does. She’d told herself to just do it by her birthday, but after day passes and she still hasn’t, she tells herself she’s no coward. It’s impossible to tell if Tatsuki reciprocates, but Orihime’s spent so many years of her life pining and doing nothing, if not for Tatsuki than for someone else. And Tatsuki is Tatsuki; she’s not going to end their friendship over something like this.

Two more weeks pass, and then Orihime isn’t planning to make her move but she does it anway, an impulse getting the better of her. Tatsuki brings over leftovers again, and Orihime’s apartment is hot. There’s no reason to touch Tatsuki’s hand when she takes the bag, nor to keep her hand out.

“Orihime? What are you doing?”

She steps forward and plants her lips on Tatsuki’s. There is, as expected, the smell of plain lip balm, of sweat, and also of something faintly sweet and spicy, probably the food. Tatsuki’s lips are soft, her fingers on the bag trembling, and when Orihime draws back, she can see Tatsuki’s face flushing the way it rarely does, rarely has since middle school.

“Oh,” Tatsuki says.

Her eyes are wide; her hair is falling in her face. The strap of her tank top is twisted, and Orihime thinks how easily she could pull it aside, how good Tatsuki’s shoulders look shown off like that. 

Tatsuki’s fingers let go of the food, finally, and Orihime is left with the bag dangling from her fingers. She doesn’t want to put it away, and she’s always hungry but now is not the time. There’s enough space to leave it on the table right next to her, so she does, and then takes Tatsuki’s hands in hers. 

Sometimes, neither of them (mostly Orihime) can’t shut up. Sometimes, they don’t have to talk. Tatsuki pulls ORihime back in, squeezing her hands, kissing her harder, but no less honestly. Her hands come up to Orihime’s face, calluses on her fingers over the shells of Orihime’s ears, teeth on Orihime’s lip. Orihime pushes down both straps of Tatsuki’s tank top. They’re still in the doorway; Orihime takes a few steps backward and nearly trips over a book lying on the floor. 

Tatsuki’s face is still flushed, but she’s smiling, relaxed, full of affection, the same that Orihime’s bursting with. 

“Pick me up and carry me, Tatsuki-chan.”

Tatsuki steals another kiss before dropping her on the bed and collapsing on top of her, though Orihime gives it gladly. And then Orihime steals one back.

“We’re even,” she says.

“Is it a competition?” says Tatsuki.

“Yes,” Orihime says.

They both win, and they both lose count; it’s no siller a game than the once they used to play in school with arbitrary collections of rules, and this one has more of a meaning to it. It’s both of their ways of making up for years of lost time, of not knowing their own interest (at least in Orihime’s case) and not doing anything about it, of nearly living in each other’s apartments but not quite and never crossing this line.

They eat Tatsuki’s leftovers afterwards, half-dressed, a hickey blooming on Tatsuki’s neck.

“You went overboard,” she says, but she doesn’t seem to mind too terribly.

They’ve slept in the same bed probably hundreds of times by now, though not recently, but this time it’s not just different but better. They’re so close, wrapped in the covers like a squirrel in a doll-sized winter coat. Tatsuki would probably tell her that she’s thinking strange thoughts again, but she’s already asleep, curled into Orihime’s chest.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
